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USA White Falls to Sweden; USA Blue Loses to Finland in OT

08/04/2013, 7:45pm MDT

By USAHockey.com

LAKE PLACID, N.Y. – International play at the 2013 USA Hockey National Junior Evaluation Camp began today at the Olympic Center's 1980 Herb Brooks Arena. USA White lost to Sweden, 4-2, after Sweden scored twice in the final five minutes. USA Blue fell to Finland, 6-5, in overtime.

"I think the big lesson from the first game was discipline," said Don Lucia, head coach of the 2014 U.S. National Junior Team. "Penalties are obviously costly at the international level, but penalty kill is something we haven't worked on yet. Still, it was a 2-2 game until the end of the third period. In game two, I thought that we did some nice things in the offensive zone. We did a good job down low using our size to protect the puck. We have some pieces of the puzzle that we can work with this week moving forward."

Four different USA White players recorded points and goaltenders Jon Gillies (South Portland, Maine/Providence College) and Collin Olson (Apple Valley, Minn./Ohio State Univ.) made 14 saves each, but it was Sweden that skated away with a 4-2 win.

Defenseman Matt Grzelcyk (Charlestown, Mass./Boston Univ.) opened the scoring when he fit a power-play shot from the high slot between the arm and left pad of Sweden goaltender Oscar Dansk at 3:28 of the first period.

Sweden scored the next two goals -- one early in the first period and another midway through the second -- to seize the 2-1 lead.

Andrew Copp (Ann Arbor, Mich./Univ. of Michigan) scored on a breakaway to even the score at two with just over five minutes to play in the middle frame.

In the third period, Sweden capitalized on a pair of late power plays to collect the win.

USA White plays Finland tomorrow at 4:00 p.m. ET.

In game two, Dan O'Regan (Needham, Mass./Boston Univ.) contributed two goals, Riley Barber (Pittsburgh, Pa./Miami Univ.) had three assists and eight other USA Blue players had at least a point in a 6-5 overtime setback against Finland.

After falling behind, 3-1, late in the second period, USA Blue battled back and was eventually able to take a 5-4 lead late in regulation on a pair of goals by O'Regan, and single tallies from Hudson Fasching (Burnsville, Minn./Univ. of Minnesota) and Tony DeAngelo (Sewell, N.J.).

However, Finland knotted the game with just 11 seconds remaining in the third period before scoring the game-winning goal 41 seconds into overtime.

Connor Carrick (Orland Park, Ill.) scored USA Blue's first goal and added an assist; Nic Kerdiles (Irvine, Calif./Univ. of Wisconsin) chipped in two assists to finish as USA Blue's only other player to record multiple points.